“A Wedding Sermon on Peace”

By Daniel Berrigan

(This sermon was preached at the wedding of Kristin and Radoslaw in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, New York in 2003, as the U.S. war on Iraq had begun. It has never been published.)

Our gospel [Matthew 5:1-11] surely has a poignant meaning for Kristin and Radoslaw. And for all of us here present to honor their vows – and to honor once more, the vows of our baptism.

Our country is at war. One of the beatitudes, “Blessed are the makers of peace,” touches closely on our situation, which hovers between predicament and holy opportunity.

What indeed can it mean in such days as we endure, to be ‘peacemakers’? Not ‘just war’ theorists, not ‘pacifists,’ not, surely not war makers. But ‘blessed are the peacemakers,’ ‘the makers of peace.’

The term in the original Greek, is disturbingly concrete, physical. One makes peace in somewhat the way one makes a table or a building, a school or a hospital, something useful or beautiful or both. We make peace in somewhat the way two people make a child. Makers of peace. The task is untidy, unfinished, laborious, always to be started anew. The task may involve crossing a line, getting in trouble with a law that protects war and weaponry, law that makes peacemakers liable to legal consequence.

“Blessed are the peacemakers…” There is a summons here, a calling that reaches out and out, from our bride and groom, to all of us who love and admire them. I mean something quite simple. Our country is bleeding. A wasting horrid war is claiming lives by the thousands in Iraq and Afghanistan. Most of those who die are innocent; they are children, the aged and ill, bystanders, non-combatants. The victims include American soldiers, most of whom are young, most from minority families – a familiar story.

And after the horror of 9/11, we at home are constantly being enticed by warmongering media and befouled politics, to stifle our natural affection, to transform our hearts to vessels of hatred. To turn upon one another, to rend the ties of affection and respect that bind us to one another, whether Jew, Muslim or Christian.

This is the atmosphere alas, in which our celebration takes place. Kristin and Radek will shortly pronounce their vows, ‘to love and honor’ one another, ‘all the days of my life.’

Love and honor stand at the heart of a wedding; hatred and dishonor define a war.

Our country wages war, we celebrate a wedding. And a question inevitably arises – for us all. Shall we love and honor one another; or shall we hate and dishonor one another? Shall we make our lives a celebration, shall we take joy in the vast variety of our human kind, a rainbow of color, culture, faith – Jew, Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist, Christian? Or shall we twist our human variety into an inhuman contention of hatred and dishonor? Shall we make love, or shall we make war?

At our Eucharist, the priest will shortly pronounce awesome words that transform bread and wine into the body and blood of Christ, the Maker of Peace. The priest will say, ‘This is my body, given for you.’ He will not say, ‘This is your body, destroyed by me.’ The priest will say, ‘This is the cup of my blood, poured out for you.’ The priest will not say, ‘This is the cup of your blood, shed my me.’ Thus the flesh and blood of the peacemaking Christ, who gave His life rather than taking life, passes into our flesh and blood.

We thank you, Kristin and Radek. You lead us on the right way. Taking one another, as your vows proclaim, ‘in good times and bad,’ you invite us, each of us, to take, to choose, to honor one another, ‘in good times and bad.’

Thus, we too may turn bad times to good. You lead us to those great words of Christ; ‘Love one another, as I have loved you.’ And again, and infinitely more difficult, and running utterly counter to wartime; ‘Love your enemies, do good to those who do you ill.’

We can close the gospel, close the Hebrew bible, close the Koran ‘for the duration,’ as they say. Many are doing so, in our country and elsewhere. Or we can courageously keep the holy texts open, in our hearts and our behavior, honoring them in this dark inhuman time.

We too, along with Kristin and Radek, are invited to repeat our baptismal vows at this altar. Vows that make of us peacemakers in the image of our God; and win for us the beatitudes; ‘Blessed are the peacemakers…’

Let me conclude with a poem, which I dedicate to Kristin and Radek and all of us. The poem is called simply ‘Some.’

Some stood up once, and sat down. I’ve had it, they said.

Some stood up twice, and sat down. It’s too much, they cried.

Some walked a mile, and walked away.

Some stood and stood and stood.

They were taken for fools, they were taken for being taken in.

Some walked and walked and walked. They walked the earth, they walked the waters, they walked the air.

Why do you stand, they were asked, and why do you walk?

Because of the children, they said; and because of the heart, and because of the bread.

Because the cause is the children born,

And the heart’s beat

And the risen bread.

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